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Just go to bigger cups. I swear the former HR director here used to drink out of what I can only describe as a coffee BUCKET. It had to be at least 64oz.

Personally though I've got this weird handicap in that I can't seem to make good coffee if my life depended on it, so I usually save coffee drinking as an occasional treat during a trip to the local coffee-house and get my daily caffeine from Diet Mt Dew (which I drink about 6-8 of per day:)).

- make sure the equipment is clean; Just rinsing it out isn't enough, everything needs to be washed.- grind the beans yourself, or buy fresh grounds. Coffee grounds go stale in just a few days.- use lots of coffee. 2 tablespoons per cup.- use good tasting water. If you don't like the taste of the water before it becomes coffee, you probably won't like it post brewing.

good points, all!
Also use cold water when making it, Hot water will cause the coffee to burn while it cooks and have a much more bitter flavor. The best coffee i can make is made with very good well filtered water, with out good water you will always get crap coffee.

Whoa there, Nelly. That's a lot of coffee, way more than most people use. If the parent to your post likes the coffee from his local coffeehouse, then likely he'll want something a little weaker than that.

My suggestion: buy a good, basic coffee maker. Buy a coffee measuring cup that is narrow and deep (to better accurately measure)... or use a kitchen scale to measure. Keep experimenting with water temperature (cold is best, I use ice water), the brew setting

Shipping a boutique product hundreds of miles from growers that may or may not be fairly treated and then worrying about the minuscule amount of sustainable wood fiber in the accessory is pretty inane.

I remember watching a documentary about caffeine and its effects on the brain. At first, it provides a boost to mental alertness, but when consumed on a regular basis, this edge dissapears and caffeine is required to provide your old regular mental alertness. This symptom dissapears after 2-3 weeks of abstinence.

Do what I did, ween yourself off of it, and only consume it when you really need it. This way, caffeine actually gives you a boost rather than bringing you back up to speed. I love the practical

Au contraire. The better the coffee, the more cups I'll have. At home, I'll either have espresso or French-press/cafetiere coffee. On the move, Starbucks espresso is a bit too dark a roast to my taste, but Italian ice cream parlors are usually a relatively safe bet for a good cup. When given the choice between instant coffee and tea, I'll have tea. Life's too short for bad coffee. And there's definitely more to coffee than just caffeine content or bucket sized cups.

So you start by stating how rational you think the view on terrorism has been, and go on to lament that we don't (enough) apply the same hysteria to climate change?

With the current level of polemic, those who point out holes in your arguments are painted as akin to holocaust deniers, flat-earthers and creationists and now as apparently so cynical that they care more for a cup of coffee than for people who see their land go underwater.

It seems so hysterical at times that if someone tries to object to this coffee claim by pointing out that it seems likely that the coffee plant would be able to *adapt* to climate change, the way it and everyone else on this planet has been doing for quite a while, it would almost not surprise me to see him labeled a "creationist"...

With the current level of polemic, those who point out holes in your arguments are painted as akin to holocaust deniers, flat-earthers and creationists and now as apparently so cynical that they care more for a cup of coffee than for people who see their land go underwater.

Any holes are holes in the small details. The big picture is that retaining more heat will make things get hotter. That's about as clear as that the earth is round.

The arguments about the specifics of what exactly is going to happen, but just because somebody got some of that wrong doesn't invalidate the big picture. The weather report may be wrong about that it's going to rain tomorrow, but that doesn't disprove that it rains a lot in London.

It seems so hysterical at times that if someone tries to object to this coffee claim by pointing out that it seems likely that the coffee plant would be able to *adapt* to climate change, the way it and everyone else on this planet has been doing for quite a while, it would almost not surprise me to see him labeled a "creationist"...

Do you realize that "adaption" is a potentially very nasty process?

People talk of "adaption" as if in the case of coastal cities getting flooded people would just grow gills all of a sudden and happily live underwater.

Adaption for humans will also be a messy thing. Suppose coastal cities get flooded. Well, we'll adapt, sure, through massive migrations, massive rebuilds of architecture destroyed by floods, and massive creation of new engineering projects like levees to prevent it. We'll definitely manage. However that won't happen for free, and you're going to end up paying for it, with your taxes, for instance. Some people will pay for it with their life for not getting out of the way soon enough, or will have their enconomic situation majorly screwed up.

Other life no doubt will adapt, but that doesn't mean everything will just get used to the new conditions and otherwise stay the same. It could well mean a species we like dying off and getting replaced with some weed that doesn't mind the new conditions. Over enough time things will rebalance themselves, but not necessarily in a way we will find convenient.

So you start by stating how rational you think the view on terrorism has been, and go on to lament that we don't (enough) apply the same hysteria to climate change?

You've misinterpreted what the OP was saying. I suspect deliberately.

With the current level of polemic, those who point out holes in your arguments are painted as akin to holocaust deniers, flat-earthers and creationists and now as apparently so cynical that they care more for a cup of coffee than for people who see their land go underwater.

Well firstly, the denialist movement hasn't found any holes in the theory. Which kind of makes your argument a non-sequitur, but never mind. The reason the term "denialist" is in common use is for the following reasons:

The incorrect use of the term "sceptic" to describe the movement.

The style of argument used i.e a continual stream of denials, without supporting evidence

It is the same setup as the Iraq war:
- all the experts agree
- if you don't support it, you're a terrorist
- sudden alarmism because of unrelated events (9/11 for iraq, the al gore movie for this)
- exaggerated claims (mushroom clouds vs new york under water)
- scaremongering
- ignore evidence that shows that the conclusions were assumed

I don't know much about climate or the statistics behind it. And I didn't know anything about WMDs or the intelligence business. But I know something about human motivations and in both cases, I could smell the BS a mile away.

Awesome. And I bet all these claims can be made by different people with you still feeling "they" are "all" making exaggerated claims, too.

All the experts don't agree. (Nor did they in the Iraq war. the difference there was that Cheney et al had executive power, whereas scientists don't. Scientists also have to compete in the media with hacks and politicians. See this yt video [youtube.com])

Do you believe/care about everything you're being told in the media? Who cares what those partisan quacks call you.

You feel it is an argument against "climate science" that every (shit) disaster movie after 2000 has been using that as a theme? Astonishing.

As said before, the experts don't agree on everything. Also, "citizen-researchers" (blame WSJ [wsj.com] for thinking up this imbecilic word/notion.) are being denied access to data != breakdown of the peer review process.

"I could smell the BS a mile a way" does not actually prove you're intelligent or insightful. It might just as well prove that you distrust people who tell you you're doing something that is causing something bad. Or something else entirely. But feel free to interpret the CRU "Scandal" as you like to reinforce your own opinions.. just remember it doesn't really prove anything.

But feel free to interpret the CRU "Scandal" as you like to reinforce your own opinions.. just remember it doesn't really prove anything.

It proves there is a significant agenda on the part of some of the scientists. Maybe this wasn't a surprise to you (it shouldn't have been if you've paid attention) but it does mean they will have to demonstrate their points with evidence, they can't just say they know because they are experts. Appeal to authority is a logical fallacy when the authority has been shown to be biased.

Specifically for global warming, this is the evidence I want to see:

1) I want to see that CO2 causes the greenhouse effect (this is actually fairly well established by evidence).
2) I want to see that atmospheric CO2 is also increasing (also fairly well established)
3) I want to see that the global temperature is rising (some folks dispute this, but in fact the temperature record for the last few decades seems not unreasonable to me)
4) I want to see demonstrated that the rise in CO2 is having a significant effect on the global climate. This has NOT been demonstrated with any degree of certainty.

I've looked all over to find evidence of number 4, and I haven't seen a conclusive link anywhere. There is, on the other hand, evidence that other unknown processes in the environment are having a bigger effect on global temperature than CO2.

When people are saying we should divert massive percentages of the global economy without demonstrated exactly what the effect of reducing CO2 would be (this is another unknown; it might actually make very little difference), yeah, that counts as BS.

Well, 1 and 2 have been clearly proved - it's clear that CO2 is a very effective greenhouse gas, and that ice cores show that over the past 600,000 years or so the global CO2 concentration has varied, but remained relatively low. It's only since the industrial revolution that CO2 concentration has shot up so sharply, far, far higher than it has ever been over a timescale that makes human existence look tiny.

Knowing that high CO2 concentrations do affect temperatures, even at lab scale and we're changing the concentration in the atmosphere so drastically, do you not think it might be prudent to prevent it if we can, regardless of whether we know *for certain* that it is raising the temperature of the earth?

We have the ability to cut the levels of CO2 we emit, so it seems sensible to do so. Maybe it will all be for nothing and we later find that the earth was naturally warming anyway, but we might just find that it was the right thing to do. If we do nothing, it could be far too late.

I liken this to the widespread use of the "miracle" DDT; sure, it's a great pesticide... until we learned about accumulation in higher predators and the extreme persistence of organochlorines in the environment.

Or the use of CFCs - a fabulous set of molecules, but with a rather unpleasant effect on atmospheric ozone that wasn't discovered until later.

Decent scientists on the whole don't have agendas in the same way that oil companies, coal-burning energy companies and governments do (unless they're paid specifically to have an agenda) - it's pretty easy to spot a scientist with an agenda: just look at the research. There's a reason that peer-reviewed research carries weight - reproducible results, by different people, and even dissenting opinions.

Real scientists don;t mind you checking their data, and there is a lot of it about.

There's also a very large propaganda machine that is left over from the "more doctors smoke camels" days that is very well funded, whose sole job it is to make people with no scientific qualifications question the science - often with outright lies, or by using the terminology of science as a tool. Just look at the way the term "theory" is viewed by the general public in regard to evolution; not really understanding how science defines the term.

On the evidence I have seen, I am in the belief that human industrial processes are warming the earth and that we need to do something about it quickly before the damage is very severe. We're not going to die out, and the world isn't going to kill us all like some $100 million Micheal Bay film, but there will be some significant changes that are going to affect a large proportion of the human population if we don't work on the problem. It will likely be the poorest portion of the population in the least developed nations first of course, which is another reason why I think people just want to distance themselves from it: they just don;t think it will affect their daily life, or think it is too big to fix and thus don;t want to think about it.

We have the ability to cut the levels of CO2 we emit, so it seems sensible to do so. Maybe it will all be for nothing and we later find that the earth was naturally warming anyway, but we might just find that it was the right thing to do. If we do nothing, it could be far too late.

It's a tradeoff. What exactly are you proposing we do it cut levels of CO2? Stop driving? Cap and trade? Each of these have a cost associated with them. How much are you willing to cut in order change something?

On the evidence I have seen, I am in the belief that human industrial processes are warming the earth and that we need to do something about it quickly before the damage is very severe.

On the evidence I have seen, I am of the belief that California will fall into the ocean, but there is nothing we can do about it and the damage will be very severe. In fact, it is already happening [sfgate.com]. This is an effect known as continental drift (and in the case of those apartments, erosion), and it

So in essence "it's probably on a geologic timescale if it's happening at all so it doesn't affect me, fuck my grandkids' grandkids though".

The "what are we going to do" is everything - people said the same thing about anti-knock additives to petrol - that it would be too expensive and what about all those old cars that need 4 star?! Oh woe, the economy! But we have managed it.

Changing the way we work industrially is going on all the time - greener solvents, more efficient processes (lower temps/pressures,

Yes - you've hit the nail on the head. It's hard to believe. My scepticism is a direct result of the irrational leap in your argument.

It shouldn't be, because it is such a complex system that we know so little about.

It's not really that complicated. In a bell jar, CO2 acts as a greenhouse gas. It will do the same outside of the bell jar as well - a change in location will have no effect on the thermodynamic properties of a molecule of CO2. This is high school level thermodynamics. The complexity arise when you need to measure the size of the subsequent effect, as other things come into p

If you haven't seen evidence of a scan yet, then you have been paying attention. What is interesting about he CRU e-mails is how little evidence they give for a scam. Compare them to some of the tobacco company documents to see what a real conspiracy looks like.

"A risk of Pacific island nations ending up underwater? Not a serious problem."

Not to be harsh, but the nations that would be underwater are small and not worth sacrifice by the large and important. I understand that there is sentiment in behalf of preserving every culture, but outside that there is no reason to do so. There are vast quantities of humans and as with other animals, some will thrive at the expense of others.

As for coastal cities, they can be replaced in a generation with improved infrastructu

That which man builds he can build again, and reconstruction is a great economic stimulus.

Broken window fallacy.

Now, I'm not normally one to trot out a canard often (mis)used by the armchair Austrian economists, but it definitely applies here.

We're far better off spending cash as a "stimulus" on building new infrastructure, extending capabilities, than in replacing destroyed infrastructure. I use the term "infrastructure" broadly here -- pollution-prevention or remediation efforts should be included as

The prospect of running over some hapless pedestrian isn't enough to get most people to slow down.The prospect of slowly wearing out your suspension and feeling mild discomfort for a second, however, will.

Ew, no thanks. Even the British can't drink tea without loading it with milk and sugar. Plus, I'd have to drink at least twice the volume to get the same amount of caffeine. Worst case scenario, I'd switch to caffeine pills before drinking tea daily.

Specifically harvest and sell these beans with the usual "its green 25-50%" markup plus the 10-15% free trade thing. Becomes desirable to save these species for profitability, the green-tards are separated from their money before they can do something annoying with it, and everyone wins.

As found on the warmlist [numberwatch.co.uk], this isn't the first time climate change has been accused of threatening coffee [terradaily.com]. Amazing how climate change seems to be the bane of all existence...

The decided that "Global Warming" changed to "Global Climate Change" you know in case it started cooling. They should just change it to "Global scary thing that affects everything you do and you need to give us money to protect you from it."

No, they changed "global warming" to "climate change" because idiots like you thought "global warming" meant that every single point on the planet would monotonically increase year-over-year, and to a lesser extent because "climate change" is more accurate anyway because the increase in carbon dioxide has other effects too, such as ocean acidification. Unfortunately, they failed to consider that idiots like you would think this is more evidence of a massive global conspiracy to steal your freedom and monies.

I wonder why it upsets some people here (of all places) to look into how the climate change is effecting different aspects of the ecosystem. Yes it has been happening for the entire life of the planet, but we're only just now (say the last 50 years) able to observe the effects in meaningful ways. I thought that geeks were supposed to be interested in that sort of thing. It's not like the article stated "SUV drivers and coal plants are threatening the survival of wild coffee". I like your reply, but thin

The whole globe will get warmer, but the whole globe isn't a uniform temperature. Prevailing winds and oceanic currents -- which move lots of heat around the world -- are likely to change, which will affect which places are warmed or cooled by them.

For instance, Norway and the British Isles are significantly warmed in summer by the currents in the Atlantic (it's currently 2C in London, and -10C in Quebec, which is further south). If those currents shift slightly, that will make these countries much colder i

Well, given that every species on the planet, including ourselves, is thoroughly adapted to their current environment=, I'm a little shocked you find that surprising.

For humans, which environment would that be? The Sahara Desert, the Russian Siberia, the Amazon Rainforest, the Himalayan Mountains, the US Plains, the Pacific Islands? Humans have adapted to be able to live everywhere.

Yeah, no kidding. But if the climate *changes*, then we have to actively adapt, and that means some people will die. Heat waves will kill some, cold snaps will kill others. Flooded coastal areas will displace some, while droughts and torrential rains will displace others. Meanwhile, crop and grazing land will be destroyed so that those who do adapt to the changes run the risk of starvation.

Will humans adapt? Sure! The sufficiently rich will move to more hospitable areas. Sufficient rich farmers will move to new cropland. But the subsistence farmers and the poor who lack the means to move will die.

Nah... We the poor will use the same thing that we have used since the beginning of time... Our feet, or our boats to get where we need to.

And go where? Do you understand how difficult it is to deal with millions of displaced, starving refugees? What, you think they just wander over into the next nation and set up shop? Seriously, how naive are you, exactly? All over the world there are examples of displaced populations (Africa is a great place to start looking) and the hardships they've endured, yet yo

A little bid misleading. The human adaptation is less about the organism, and more about the things we build to help us adapt. Part of that coping is to rely on other things (flora and fauna) that are much less able to follow suit, and it is those things that are threatened. Not to say that humans would not find other ways, rather that is the point, we will find other ways. But it is interesting to note that we can't really save the rest of the ecosystem, so we'd better pay attention to what is going on

Then, the question becomes, is the planet warming actually a bad thing? To cite one thing you mention, arable land, this would actually increase in a warmer world. Russia and Canada warming up would open up a very large chunk of arable land to farming or for farming more than one crop per year. Many people tend to say climate change will be bad, but never mention any benefits or to look at the end balance of good and bad.

There's a joke in Brazil about a lion that fled the zoo and ended up in a government building. Each day he would eat a civil servant. He was doing very well, until one day he ate the lady in charge of making coffee. Then people finally noticed something bad had happened.

Absolutely. It's not unlike the modern banana monoculture. As a species, the modern banana has been *very* successful, thanks to it being desirable to humans.

But monocultures are also very dangerous. By minimizing genetic variation in a population, the species becomes extremely susceptible to new types of disease, fungus, and so forth. And again, bananas teach us much, here, as there's great fear that the modern banana could end up being wiped out by disease.

Thus, protecting these heirloom species is extremely important, as it provides a pool of genetic diversity is present in the wild, providing some protection against the dangers of monoculture.

Until the 1950s, the majority of bananas consumed via expert markets were of the Gros Michel [wikipedia.org] variety. However these were very susceptible to Panama disease. A substitute had to be found and we now mainly eat the Vietnamese Cavendish variety.

No, really. Well, the best cultivar, the Gros Michel [wikipedia.org], anyway. It was a hugely profitable worldwide monoculture that was easy prey for the panama disease [wikipedia.org]. The banana we eat today is the less tasty, more easily bruised Cavendish variety.

Very much so. Michael Pollan's book "Botany of Desire" is about the way four plants' usefulness has been a great advantage to the plant. Not just deliciousness (apples and potatoes) but also attractiveness (tulips) and, uh... cannabis.

Strange you should mention that. I had a friend who, around the time we invaded Iraq, thought it made sense to invade if we got lower gas prices. Then after the invasion gas prices went up. She was really upset after that and thought the invasion was a waste.

You'll have to look a little deeper to find the true reason we invaded Iraq (hint: it [newamericancentury.org] wasn't [newamericancentury.org] exactly [newamericancentury.org] a [newamericancentury.org] secret [wikipedia.org]).

Conserving the genetic diversity within this genus has implications for the sustainability of our daily cup

... geeks for the anti-global-warming ring:

Happy day, geek walking up to coffee machine to read note: "Please be informed, due to potential global warming, there is no more coffee, EVER.".

Geek falls on his knees to the floor, with his dilbert printed mug explodes in chards upon impact on the same floor, with a sharp sound as the geek releases a load screaming while shaking his fist at the heavens:"OMG NOT MY COFFEE! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! ID ANYTHING FOR COFFEE! IF I ONLY SAW THIS ONE COMING! I was soo proud, thinking I could bend nature, the fool I have been", while he rests his face, sobbing, in his hands in the mids of his fallen empire of productivity, the once caffeinated multitasking geek, he.

That very deperate moment the globalwarming-genie pops in with a puff of black CO2-rich smoke:"There is a way, my good brave intellectual... But it will be a challenging quest...", while the disoriented geek looks up, licking his thinkgeek caffeine soapbar, bubbling a partial disoriented yet interested:"Wut?"

So they are running out of boogie men - now it's "you'll lose your daily caffeine." Coffee trees enjoy warm climates; what if "global warming" will BENEFIT coffee crops? Most of these guys don't know their asses from their coffee cups, how do they know how an entire species of trees will react to climate change?

That tree survived for millions of years on a planet that faced all kinds of cataclysmic events; I am sure it will be just fine, especially under the protection of mankind.

Nope, sorry. Coffee trees enjoy a very *specific* type of climate, which is why the growing regions are restricted to specific altitudes, latitudes, rainfall rates, and so forth. Change that environment significantly and the result would be very destructive.

That tree survived for millions of years on a planet that faced all kinds of cataclysmic events

In their current form? Doubtful. All plants either evolve or die off. More likely is that the tree evolved to fit a particular niche that wasn't filled by any other plant. But the current species is now very sensitive to it's growing conditions, as it's exquisitely well adapted to where it grows (as any coffee cultivator will tell you).

Of course, given enough time, species will typically evolve to new pressures (although they may just as often die out... when was the last time you saw a sabre toothed tiger?). Unless, of course, the rate of change is too drastic, and the species is unable to adapt before those pressures become overwhelming (poor poor tigers)...

Nope, sorry. Coffee trees enjoy a very *specific* type of climate, which is why the growing regions are restricted to specific altitudes, latitudes, rainfall rates, and so forth. Change that environment significantly and the result would be very destructive.

Coffee grows in Hawaii, Puerto Rico, Vietnam, Costa Rica, Mexico, Indonesia, Jamaica, Ghana, Ethiopia, and numerous other places around the world. It has its limitations; it's not going to grow in North Dakota. But it's not quite the hothouse flower you make it out to be.

We'll keep them going as climate changes - they hold too high an economic value for us.

You're absolutely right. We'll definitely protect the domesticated cultivars. But the article is warning about the loss of *wild* varieties. And humans won't bother protecting those as they offer no obvious economic benefit.

That's a good point, however the modern man has been drinking coffee en masse for what...a hundred or two hundred years? What's the worst that can happen? We stop drinking coffee, we sleep better, work less and are less strung out. That sounds all good to me:)

... because eventually Good Ol' Global Warming (GOGW) will devastate those tropical countries too stupid to take extreme advantage of their natural crop resources to subjugate the world - and eventually it will all be grown in England! Coffee, wine, bananas, Civets, all that 1st world cash-crop crap; hell, even cocaine! And then England can finally return to its rightful place as the oppressor of millions / billions through simple honest restriction of trade! And the US can go f**k itself! (totally unrelate

Nifty trolling. But the UK doesn't have enough land to grow enough produce to feed its current population. Without drastic population reduction (unachievable without significant economic strife) we need imports.

Well if you're going to bring common sense in to it all then I think we _can_ feed ourselves, if we focus on community supported agriculture, reduce the consumption of meat and reduce waste and more sustainable agriculture - I think we could even raise the amount of people supported by a hectre of crop land by maybe 1/8 th with just a change in some agro methods - and maybe replacing 50% of the land resources devoted to farm animals would also increase arable yieldsof course my original point would be that

I don't know if younger or less aware drinkers have noticed, but there is a lot of truly horrid southeast Asian farmed coffee that has entered the market. I've been tasting it mixed with more expensive beans to make "morning blends", or used in flavored coffee where its lack of coffee aroma and its aftertaste of lemongrass is concealed. The next time you visit one of those less successful coffee bars, try to get a good whiff of the beans before they're ground to see why they're so much less expensive and so much less successful. The distinction between the richer, more full-scented, quality beans and the weird, always half-priced, Asian sacks of mud, sticks, and a few coffee beans is quite noticeable.

I think we are all in agreement here, that as long as the regular coffee bean stays in production, we don't care about the rest of them.So many more important things then coffee beans have gone extinct due to our hand, or because of our pollution, that we can not seriously worry about this without bursting out laughing.

TOA refers to wild coffee. You think the wild coffee will magically migrate along with the climate patterns? Leaping over any unsuitable terrain?

Even for farmed coffee, I can foresee significant obstacles to moving production. Will there be enough land at the new latitude? Will whatever is currently grown there also be displaced? If not, where can the coffee go? Is the terrain suitable?